The Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission (COSO) is a joint initiative of five private sector organizations, established in the United States, dedicated to providing thought leadership to executive management and governance entities on critical aspects of organizational governance, business ethics, internal control, enterprise risk management, fraud, and financial reporting. COSO has established a common internal control model against which companies and organizations may assess their control systems. COSO is supported by five supporting organizations, including the Institute of Management Accountants (IMA), the American Accounting Association (AAA), the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA), the Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) and Financial Executives International (FEI).

Organizational overview
COSO was formed in 1985 to sponsor the National Commission on Fraudulent Financial Reporting (the Treadway Commission). The Treadway Commission was originally jointly sponsored and funded by five main professional accounting associations and institutes headquartered in the United States: the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA), American Accounting Association (AAA), Financial Executives International (FEI), Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) and the Institute of Management Accountants (IMA). The Treadway Commission recommended that the organizations sponsoring the Commission work together to develop integrated guidance on internal control. These five organizations formed what is now called the Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway Commission.

The original chairman of the Treadway Commission was James C. Treadway, Jr., Executive Vice President and General Counsel, Paine Webber and a former Commissioner of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Hence, the popular name "Treadway Commission". David L. Landsittel is COSO's current Chairman; he replaced Larry E. Rittenberg.

History
Due to questionable corporate political campaign finance practices and foreign corrupt practices in the mid -1970s, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the U.S. Congress enacted campaign finance law reforms and the 1977 Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) which criminalized transnational bribery and required companies to implement internal control programs. In response, the Treadway Commission, a private-sector initiative, was formed in 1985 to inspect, analyze, and make recommendations on fraudulent corporate financial reporting.

The Treadway Commission studied the financial information reporting system over the period from October 1985 to September 1987 and issued a report of findings and recommendations in October 1987, Report of the National Commission on Fraudulent Financial Reporting. As a result of this initial report, the Committee of Sponsoring Organizations (COSO) was formed and it retained Coopers & Lybrand, a major CPA firm, to study the issues and author a report regarding an integrated framework of internal control.

In September 1992, the four volume report entitled Internal Control— Integrated Framework was released by COSO and later re-published with minor amendments in 1994. This report presented a common definition of internal control and provided a framework against which internal control systems may be assessed and improved. This report is one standard that U.S. companies use to evaluate their compliance with FCPA. According to a poll by CFO magazine released in 2006, 82% of respondents claimed they used COSO's framework for internal controls. Other frameworks used by respondents included COBIT, AS2 (Auditing Standard No. 2, PCAOB), and SAS 55/78 (AICPA).